The Belgrade City Assembly rejected the proposal Spasoja Z. Milovanović, president of the Bitef Board, to be the selector of this year's edition of that festival Andras Urban the director and director of the theater "Újvidéki Szinház" in Novi Sad and the founder of the international theater festival "Desire Central station", which is considered the second Bitef.
Since then, so since mid-February, Bitef's selector has not been appointed.
Spasoje Z. Milovanović tells "Vreme" that after Urbana, the Board had several proposals, but they abandoned them, assuming that they would not be accepted.
Bitef selectors
"That's why we decided to select the program of Bitef this year, as it is written in the Decision on Amendments and Supplements to the decision on permanent manifestations in the field of culture of importance for the city of Belgrade", he says and notes that he has the greatest responsibility in this work.
According to the aforementioned legal act, which was adopted in May last year, the program of the manifestation is determined by the Board, with the fact that, if necessary, it can propose collaborators. This Committee tried to take advantage of that possibility by proposing Urban, but the circumstances forced it to choose the plays itself.
That is why the selection of this year's Bitef is decided by the Festival Board. Except Savior Ž. Milovanović, who is a playwright and until recently director of the National Theater in Nis, and who, as he says, "takes all responsibility on himself", there are also Uroš Mijatović, director of the Bitef Theater Miloš Latinović, Ana Veljković and Srđan Obrenović from the Belgrade Drama Theater.
Spasoje Z. Milovanović has selection experience in the "Teatar na raskršću" festival, a festival of Balkan theater held in Niš, which Milovanović initiated. But Bitef selectors are still required to know the current world scene and contacts with famous festivals, theaters, directors...
"I have a good team," says Milovanović, and adds that "a show is always a show, they just differ in aesthetics."
The program will be in mid-April
He states that they are working hard to compile the program and that he expects to publish it in mid-April. "We give the maximum in the given circumstances," he adds.
Among those given circumstances is the budget. The city assembly allocated 20.000.000 dinars for this year's Bitef, which is too little for the program expected from Bitef.
"I expect that it will not be all the money, that some friends will help us with that," announced Milovanović.
"In my classification of our theater festivals, Bitef is the most exciting festival of international theater and deserves the best performances in the world. Sterija's theater is the best of domestic drama festivals, Theater at the Crossroads is a regional festival that shows plays from only 13 countries, and only Bitef can and should have world performances", assesses Spasoje Ž. Milovanovic.
Who believes in miracles...
He says that negotiations are ongoing with various theaters from abroad, that nothing has been agreed yet, but that he expects that everything will be resolved soon.
"It didn't start on time, a festival like this is being prepared for at least a year. But, since I can't change that condition, I'm trying to do the best I can."
Milovanović states that he wanted to bring one play from Canada "but they are free only next year", as well as plays from Germany and Sweden.
At this point, the problem of a small budget arises again, but Milovanović says that "he who believes in miracles creates miracles."
"Bitef festival is a state project, and it deserves the best. We are now trying to achieve it," concludes Spasoje Milovanović, selector of this year's Bitef and chairman of the board of that festival.
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